Tech
AI needed to stop global IT outages as expert warns ‘humans are not good enough’
ARTIFICIAL intelligence could be the key to saving the world from another global IT catastrophe, an expert revealed.
Humans will need to rely more on machines to spot dangerous mistakes that can result in mass outages like Friday’s worldwide Windows PC shutdown.
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A rogue software update sent to PCs left them unable to turn on, stuck at the dreaded “Blue Screen of Death”.
This meant that airlines, banks, supermarkets, and even hospitals struggled to function normally.
The culprit was an update by security giant CrowdStrike to its Falcon anti-virus software for businesses.
Speaking to The U.S. Sun, security expert Marc Manzano said that artificial intelligence could help us avoid problems like this in the future.
Read more on global IT outage
“There has been an increasing trend to use AI to help developers write software code,” said Marc, general manager of cybersecurity at SandboxAQ.
“This can indeed boost developer productivity, but where we need more help from AI is in improving quality assurance of code.
“This major global outage that brought thousands of flights and businesses to a standstill reminds us that humans are not very good at catching errors in thousands of lines of code.
“This is where AI can help a lot.
“In particular, we need AI trained to look for the interdependence of new software updates with the existing stack of software.”
CrowdStrike’s CEO apologized for the global security gaffe, saying he was “deeply sorry”.
The company has issued a fix that is being pushed out around the world.
But many machines that were already affected by the erroneous update will need to be repaired manually.
The mistake was so serious that experts told The U.S. Sun that it could take “weeks” for the world to recover from the mistake.
What is CrowdStrike?
THE global cyber outage affecting TV channels, banks, hospitals, airports and emergency services appears to relate to an issue at cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike.
IT security firm CrowdStrike ran a recorded phone message on Friday – saying it was aware of reports of crashes on Microsoft’s Windows operating system relating to its Falcon sensor.
A prerecorded message said: “Thanks for contacting CrowdStrike support. CrowdStrike is aware of reports of crashes on Windows… related to the Falcon sensor.”
The Falcon system monitors the computers it is installed on and detects hacks and bugs before responding to them.
CrowdStrike, headquartered in Austin, Texas, says it is a global security leader which provides an advanced platform to protect data.
A CrowdStrike update on Friday is said to have caused a critical error in Microsoft operating systems, affecting millions worldwide.
The company regularly updates systems with new anti-virus software
Toby Murray, associate professor in the School of Computing and Information Systems at The University of Melbourne, Australia said: “If Falcon is suffering a malfunction then it could be causing a widespread outage for two reasons .
“One: Falcon is widely deployed on many computers, and two: because of Falcon’s privileged nature.
“Falcon is a bit like anti-virus software: it is regularly updated with information about the latest online threats.
“It is possible that today’s outage may have been caused by a buggy update to Falcon.”.
Cyber expert Troy Hunt told Australian TV network Seven: “It looks like they’ve pushed a bad update, which is presently nuking every machine that takes it.”
We also learned that hackers might try to replicate a similar outage in the future.
The good news is that the update was only pushed to business machines running CrowdStrike security software.
And it also didn’t affect Mac users, which left Apple fans feeling fortunate.
Worryingly however, crooks are expected to target potential victims with scams, even if their machines weren’t affected.
IT OUTAGE SCAMMERS – BEWARE!
Beware the scammers, warns Sean Keach, The Sun’s Head of Technology and Science.
This is going to cause a flurry of dangerous online scams.
Whenever major tech events happen like this, the criminals come crawling out of the woodwork to take advantage of innocent internet users.
You might find yourself receiving strange calls, texts, or emails, warning you about a hack and asking for info.
So be extremely cautious if you’re being asked for personal data, like your credit card info or phone number, to fix this IT outage.
You might also be told you need to download some security software urgently.
That’s another classic scam that lets crooks install dangerous malware on your machines.
Don’t fall for it: your computer should be totally fine, so you don’t need to take any action as a regular person.
This wasn’t a cyberattack – it’s just a bad computer update for businesses. Don’t listen to the scammers.
It’s important to be on the look-out for suspicious emails, text messages, and calls.
Cyber-criminals will be hoping that confusion around the event will cause people to make panicked decisions – and hand over personal info or money.
A Microsoft spokesperson told The U.S. Sun. “Earlier today, a CrowdStrike update was responsible for bringing down a number of IT systems globally.
“We are actively supporting customers to assist in their recovery.”
CROWDSTRIKE BLAMED – CEO’S FULL REPLY
Here’s an official statement from CrowdStrike CEO George Kurtz…
“Today was not a security or cyber incident.
“Our customers remain fully protected.
“We understand the gravity of the situation and are deeply sorry for the inconvenience and disruption.
“We are working with all impacted customers to ensure that systems are back up and they can deliver the services their customers are counting on.
“As noted earlier, the issue has been identified and a fix has been deployed.
“There was an issue with a Falcon content update for Windows Hosts. For the latest information that we will continuously update, please refer to the CrowdStrike website, my posts on LinkedIn, and my posts on X.
“ will continue to provide updates to our community and the industry as they become available.”
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